When we use the word mission, it is meant to communicate our central purpose as to why we exist as a church. We find this purpose from what God tells us in the Bible. The paragraph below states our mission as a church, and the Bible references that follow are some of the key passages that have brought us to this understanding of our mission. “The First Baptist Church of Rockford, Illinois, exists to glorify God by expounding the truths of His Word; by establishing mature followers of Christ who declare God’s excellencies corporately in worship and individually in life; by passionately spreading Christ’s saving gospel; and by perpetuating God’s work by reproducing itself in Rockford, Illinois, the United States, and the world.” Key passages that teach this mission are Matthew 28:18–20; Acts 1:8; 2:41–47; Ephesians 4:11-16; 2 Peter 3:18; and Jude 3.